Last week was great! Not only did I start developing my LiA project, but I also got to venture out into the East Bay to work with some other organizations. 

After several meetings with other EBC (Ella Baker Center) organizers, I formulated a project that is relevant to my interests and beneficial to my organization. Next week, we will be hosting our annual 'Oakland NOSL' (Night Out for Safety and Liberation), and for my project, I will be conducting interviews asking people, "What does safety look and feel like to you?"  The idea for this event is that we gather as a community to share visions of safer communities WITHOUT increased police presence and violence. Programming will vary from political education to community healing and celebration-- all without police presence. EBC previously did a twitter campaign asking people to use #safetyis to share their aspirations for Oakland, and I thought it would be a good idea to take this same idea but with a visual element. So, the end product will be a video compilation of the interviews I conducted at the event, showcasing our community's vision for justice and liberation AND highlighting EBC's work. I've been really interested in photography and using artistic skills as a tool for political organizing and activism, so I'm very excited to have all of these elements come together for this project. I'm a little nervous about how much I need to learn to make this happen-- with video editing software especially--but I know it will be worth it in the end. 

Additionally, because I got a jump start on my work last week, come Wednesday I had a good amount of free time on my schedule. So, upon hearing that UC Berkeley broke ground on the development of People's Park, I went to the area to talk to people about what we can do to protect the parks in the East Bay. Upon talking to several locals, I got in touch with an amazing organization-- East Bay Food Not Bombs-- who is providing free food to the unhoused people displaced by the University's development. Through this I was able to then work my first volunteer shift the next day. I spent 2 hours serving food to people in and around the UC Berkeley community and had a really nice time. Not only did I get plugged into an amazing organization, but I also got to meet so many lovely people in the process. We talked about everything from sci fi to the state of California's housing crisis. Experiences like these-- where I'm out in the community talking to and working with people-- are the ones that I learn the most from and which keep me going. If you want to learn more about what's going on at People's Park, check out this link:

https://www.cbsnews.com/sanfrancisco/news/fight-over-peoples-park-development-in-berkeley-continues/